A Night time Wander
by Lady Eleanor Boleyn
Summary: On her last night in the Tower, Queen Anne Boleyn comes to terms with a bitter truth. Songfic to "On my Own" from Les Miserables.


_AN I don't own either the song or the Tudors - and I never said I did, either._

**And now I'm all alone again**

**Nowhere to turn, no-one to go to**

How had it come to this? How had she, Anne Boleyn, Queen of England, France and Ireland, mistress of the King's heart, become nothing more than a fallen prisoner?

She tossed restlessly on her bed, watching the slivers of moonlight flit across the room, lighting her maidservants' faces. It was late; she needed to rest, but her mind, always so engagingly sharp, whirled and spun, refusing to let her rest. She kept replaying the last decade in her mind, trying to work out where it had all gone so wrong.

**Without a home, without a friend**

**Without a face to say hello to**

She didn't know. But it had. Somehow, it had gone wrong, and now she was to die, alone and friendless, the King's mind poisoned against her, pronounced guilty and shamed by her own uncle.

Anne glanced down at her servants. They were sleeping like logs – they'd never notice if she went for a wander tonight, as she had done nearly every other night.

**But now the night is near**

**And I can make believe he's here.**

Yes. A wander sounded like a good idea. She would go alone, and she would think of Henry. Not Henry the monster, the Henry who had ordered her execution, but rather Henry the lover who had adored her for so long.

**Sometimes I walk alone at night**

**When everybody else is sleeping**

Flinging a crimson cape trimmed with swansdown over her nightshift, Anne slipped from the room.

Everyone else had already retired for the night. The Tower was silent around her.

Or no. It wasn't. It was buzzing. It was alive. Alive with her memories.

**I think of him, and I'm happy with**

**The company I'm keeping**

**The city goes to bed and I can live inside my head**

The sights, the sounds, even the smells of the first years she had spent back at the English Court; they pressed in upon her, demanding her attention. First and foremost though, was the mighty King, the King who had such presence, the King whose heart and mind she had captured so easily.

Great Harry – Henry the Eighth of England, France and Ireland.

**On my own**

**Pretending he's beside me**

Anne knew she was alone in the silent chambers, yet somehow, as she turned the corner, he was there. Waiting for her. She was sure of it – she could see him.

She turned away, cold-shouldering him, as she had done so often before, when she had first been weaving her web around him. She moved off down the nearest passage, and he followed her, just as she had known he would. She quickened her pace, but he continued to stalk her, marking her pace, until, finally unnerved, she stumbled.

Then, he moved like lightening. In an instant, he was at her side, sweeping her into his arms, raining kisses down upon her.

**All alone, I walk with him till morning**

**Without him, I feel his arms around me **

Anne knew she had to be dreaming. Henry hadn't treated her like this for months, not since he had become enraptured with that Seymour milksop, after she had miscarried her son, but she was so happy to be held as he was holding her, that she gave up struggling to be put down, and briefly closed her eyes in sheer ecstasy.

**And when I lose my way I close my **

**Eyes and he has found me**

Anne moved as though she were in a dream. Her eyes were open again, but she was seeing nothing. Hence it was a surprise when she blinked, and suddenly found herself in the Tower Gardens. It was even more of a surprise when she realised that Henry, be it a phantom of him, and not the man himself, was still with her. He stood a couple of paces away, with his back to her. She tiptoed to his side, and slipped her arm through his. They were together again, as they were meant to be.

**In the rain the pavement shines like silver**

**All the lights are misty in the river**

**In the darkness the trees are full of starlight**

**And all I see is him and me forever and forever**

It was a magical night. The pond, usually so flat and dull, seemed to gleam in the moonlight. Gleam like one of those shining silver florins that Anne had so often given to the poor, not to mention spent like water, as though they would never cease to be at her disposal. How wrong she had been!

In the dark depths of the pond, the flames that burned so brightly in the Tower windows and nearby torches seemed to gain an ethereal quality, to lose their sharp edges and merely fade away into nothing.

Best of all though, the pond held Anne's own reflection, and if she peered through half-closed eyelids, she definitely saw Henry at her side.

Leaning against him, she gazed hungrily at the two of them, drinking in every detail – the swan floating past, its white coat standing out against the blackness of the night, the way the starlight played in the branches of the trees above, and appeared to make her raven-black tresses glitter like rows and rows of precious gems; the way Henry's arm curved tenderly about her slender waist. It was simply idyllic.

**And I know it's only in my mind**

**That I'm talking to myself and not to him**

Or was it? For now as she talked idly to Henry, believing she had him again, she lost him. She stood alone once more.

"_No!" _she cried vehemently, fighting to return to her dream world, squeezing her eyes tightly shut, blocking out the night around her.

She did return, in a way. She did. It had merely all gone horribly wrong.

**And although I know that he is blind**

**Still, I say, there's a way for us**

The world had changed around her. She was in the Great Hall at Greenwich Palace now, and she was with Henry, but he paid no heed to her.

Instead, he stared past her at the pretty blonde wench who stood amongst her ladies. Lady Jane Seymour.

With a jolt of furious envy, Anne called for music, and began to dance - dance as she had never danced before. She was determined to show Henry that she, not Jane, was best suited to him, that she was already the perfect wife and Queen for him, and that she would be mother to the heir he craved, if only he gave her a chance.

**I love him**

**But when the night is over**

**He is gone – the river's just a river**

To no avail. Henry left the room, beckoning Jane Seymour to his side as he did so. Anne ran out to watch them leave, and saw them getting aboard a boat, and being rowed out on to the waters of the Thames. She stared after them, then down at the river.

How lifeless it seemed! How dull and black! It had certainly lost its magic that night.

**Without him the world around me changes**

**The trees are bare and everywhere the **

**Streets are full of strangers**

So had the rest of the world.

Without Henry's invigorating presence at her side, everything was different. The trees, which had once sparkled so enticingly in the moonlight, now stood out blackly and silently against the dark sky. Nothing sang out, nothing drew Anne to them as they always had before.

The people around her, who sank into bows and curtsies as she passed, no longer seemed distinguishable, no longer seemed to be separate entities, but rather all part of the same faceless mob.

Panicking now, Anne screamed out for her sister, her father, her brother, _anyone_, in fact, who could help her. She ran blindly, her only desire to get away from that now menacing crowd.

**I love him **

**But every day I 'm learning**

**All my life I've only been pretending**

Suddenly, Anne came back down to Earth with a bump. As she sat up, and rubbed her head, it suddenly became clear. Of course! She understood now. Henry had never loved her. Not the way she had forced herself to be able to love him. She had been an exciting conquest, nothing more.

His determination to have her for his own had caused him to marry her, but, as far as she as a person was concerned, there wasn't a mite of love within him – there never had been.

**Without me his world will go on turning**

**A world that's full of happiness**

**That I have never known**

Nor did Henry truly love Mistress Seymour. She too was nothing more than an attractive, alluring prospect for some fun; a challenge to be overcome, for Henry had never truly loved any woman, not even Queen Katherine, who had been his wife for over twenty years.

As long as he had power, and as long as the Court was full of pretty young things that he could run after, and eventually possess, he would be happy. For all that he was a king, he had no real dignity.

**I love him**

**I love him**

**I love him**

**But only on my own**

Well, Anne was different. Picking herself up from where she had fallen after running into an oak tree, she dusted off her robe.

She had been anointed Queen of England, France and Ireland, and though she had been sentenced to die on the morrow, she would die with dignity. Henry had never loved her with all his heart and soul, but she had loved him, and for the sake of that love, she would not rail against fate.

No. She would show the crowds, and the rest of the world, some of the dignity that Henry lacked.

She would die a true Queen.


End file.
